Editing Fascism (section)

==Criticism==
Fascist parties were closely contested by [[anti-fascist]] movements from the [[political centre]] and [[left wing]] throughout the [[Interwar period]]. The defeat of the [[Axis powers]] in [[World War II]] and subsequent revelation of the [[crimes against humanity]] committed during the Holocaust by Germany have led to an almost universal condemnation of both past and present forms of fascism in the modern era. "Fascism" is today used across the political spectrum as a pejorative or byword for perceived authoritarianism and other forms of political evil.

===Anti-democratic and tyrannical===
{{See also|Criticism of democracy}}
[[File:Hitler and Franco at Hendaye (en.wiki).jpg|thumb|upright|Hitler and Spanish dictator [[Francisco Franco]] in the [[Meeting at Hendaye]], on 23 October 1940{{sfnp|Lowe|2006|p=250}}{{sfnp|Paxton|2004|p=149}}]]
One of the most common and strongest criticisms of fascism is that it is a [[tyranny]].{{sfnp|Boesche|2010|p=11}} Fascism is deliberately and entirely non-democratic and anti-democratic.{{sfnmp|1a1=Clarke|1a2=Foweraker|1y=2001|1p=540|Pollard|1998|2p=121|Griffin|1991|3p=42}}

Fascism's extreme authoritarianism and nationalism often manifest as a belief in [[racial purity]] or a [[master race]], usually blended with some variant of [[racism]] or [[discrimination]] against a demonized "[[Other (philosophy)|Other]]", such as [[Jews]], [[homosexuals]], [[transgender people]], [[ethnic minorities]], or [[immigrants]]. These ideas have motivated fascist regimes to commit [[massacre]]s, [[forced sterilizations]], [[deportation]]s, and [[genocide]]s.{{sfnmp|1a1=Kallis|1y=2011|1p=|2a1=Paxton|2y=1998|2p=|3a1=Lancaster|3y=2011|3pp=366–368}} During [[World War II]], the genocidal and imperialist ambitions of the fascist [[Axis powers]] resulted in the murder of millions of people. [[Federico Finchelstein]] wrote that fascism {{blockquote|...encompassed [[totalitarianism]], [[state terrorism]], [[imperialism]], [[racism]] and, in the German case, the most radical genocide of the last century: [[the Holocaust]]. Fascism, in its many forms, did not hesitate to kill its own citizens as well as its colonial subjects in its search for ideological and political closure. Millions of civilians perished on a global scale during the apogee of fascist ideologies in Europe and beyond.{{sfnp|Finchelstein|2008|p=320}}}}

===Unprincipled opportunism===
Some critics of Italian fascism have said that much of the ideology was merely a by-product of unprincipled [[opportunism]] by Mussolini and that he changed his political stances merely to bolster his personal ambitions while he disguised them as being purposeful to the public.{{sfnp|Schreiber|Stegemann|Vogel|1995|p=111}} [[Richard Washburn Child]], the American ambassador to Italy who worked with Mussolini and became his friend and admirer, defended Mussolini's opportunistic behaviour by writing: <blockquote>Opportunist is a term of reproach used to brand men who fit themselves to conditions for the reasons of self-interest. Mussolini, as I have learned to know him, is an opportunist in the sense that he believed that mankind itself must be fitted to changing conditions rather than to fixed theories, no matter how many hopes and prayers have been expended on theories and programmes.<ref>{{harvp|Mussolini|1998|p=ix}}. (Note: Mussolini wrote the second volume about his fall from power as head of government of the Kingdom of Italy in 1943, though he was restored to power in northern Italy by the German military.)</ref></blockquote> Child quoted Mussolini as saying: "The sanctity of an ism is not in the ism; it has no sanctity beyond its power to do, to work, to succeed in practice. It may have succeeded yesterday and fail to-morrow. Failed yesterday and succeed to-morrow. The machine, first of all, must run!"{{sfnp|Mussolini|1998|p=ix}}

Some have criticized Mussolini's actions during the outbreak of World War I as opportunistic for seeming to suddenly abandon Marxist egalitarian internationalism for non-egalitarian [[nationalism]] and note, to that effect, that upon Mussolini endorsing Italy's intervention in the war against Germany and Austria-Hungary, he and the new fascist movement received financial support from Italian and foreign sources, such as [[Italian Ansaldo company|Ansaldo]] (an armaments firm) and other companies{{sfnp|Mack Smith|1997|p=284}} as well as the British Security Service [[MI5]].{{sfnp|Kington|2009}} Some, including Mussolini's socialist opponents at the time, have noted that regardless of the financial support he accepted for his pro-interventionist stance, Mussolini was free to write whatever he wished in his newspaper {{lang|it|Il Popolo d'Italia}} without prior sanctioning from his financial backers.{{sfnp|O'Brien|2014|p=37}} Furthermore, the major source of financial support that Mussolini and the fascist movement received in World War I was from France and is widely believed to have been French socialists who supported the French government's war against Germany and who sent support to Italian socialists who wanted Italian intervention on France's side.{{sfnp|Gregor|1979|p=200}}

Mussolini’s transformation away from Marxism into what eventually became fascism began prior to World War I, as Mussolini had grown increasingly pessimistic about Marxism and egalitarianism while becoming increasingly supportive of figures who opposed egalitarianism, such as Friedrich Nietzsche.{{sfnp|Golomb|Wistrich|2002|p=249}} By 1902, Mussolini was studying Georges Sorel, Nietzsche and [[Vilfredo Pareto]].{{sfnp|Delzel|1970|p=96}} Sorel's emphasis on the need for overthrowing decadent liberal democracy and capitalism by the use of violence, direct action, general strikes and [[Machiavelli|neo-Machiavellian]] appeals to emotion impressed Mussolini deeply.{{sfnp|Delzel|1970|p=3}} Mussolini's use of Nietzsche made him a highly unorthodox socialist, due to Nietzsche's promotion of elitism and anti-egalitarian views.{{sfnp|Golomb|Wistrich|2002|p=249}} Prior to World War I, Mussolini's writings over time indicated that he had abandoned the Marxism and egalitarianism that he had previously supported in favour of Nietzsche's {{lang|de|übermensch}} concept and anti-egalitarianism.{{sfnp|Golomb|Wistrich|2002|p=249}} In 1908, Mussolini wrote a short essay called "Philosophy of Strength" based on his Nietzschean influence, in which Mussolini openly spoke fondly of the ramifications of an impending war in Europe in challenging both religion and [[nihilism]]: "[A] new kind of free spirit will come, strengthened by the war, ... a spirit equipped with a kind of sublime perversity, ... a new free spirit will triumph over God and over Nothing."{{sfnp|Gori|2004|p=14}}

===Ideological dishonesty===
Fascism has been criticized for being ideologically dishonest. Major examples of ideological dishonesty have been identified in Italian fascism's changing relationship with German Nazism.{{sfnmp|Gillette|2001|1p=17|Pollard|1998|2p=129}} Fascist Italy's official foreign policy positions commonly used rhetorical ideological [[hyperbole]] to justify its actions, although during [[Dino Grandi]]'s tenure as Italy's foreign minister the country engaged in {{lang|de|[[realpolitik]]}} free of such fascist hyperbole.{{sfnp|Burgwyn|1997|p=58}} Italian fascism's stance towards German Nazism fluctuated from support from the late 1920s to 1934, when it celebrated Hitler's rise to power and Mussolini's first meeting with Hitler in 1934; to opposition from 1934 to 1936 after the assassination of Italy's allied leader in Austria, [[Engelbert Dollfuss]], by Austrian Nazis; and again back to support after 1936, when Germany was the only significant power that did not denounce [[Italy's invasion and occupation of Ethiopia]].{{cn|date=May 2025}}

After antagonism exploded between Nazi Germany and [[Kingdom of Italy|Fascist Italy]] over the assassination of Austrian Chancellor Dollfuss in 1934, Mussolini and Italian fascists denounced and ridiculed Nazism's racial theories, particularly by denouncing its [[Nordic race|Nordicism]], while promoting [[Mediterraneanism]].{{sfnp|Pollard|1998|p=129}} Mussolini himself responded to Nordicists' claims of Italy being divided into Nordic and Mediterranean racial areas due to Germanic invasions of Northern Italy by claiming that while Germanic tribes such as the [[Lombards]] took control of Italy after the [[fall of Ancient Rome]], they arrived in small numbers (about 8,000) and quickly assimilated into Roman culture and spoke the [[Vulgar Latin|Latin]] language within fifty years.{{sfnp|Gillette|2001|p=93}} Italian fascism was influenced by the tradition of [[Italian nationalists]] scornfully looking down upon Nordicists' claims and taking pride in comparing the age and sophistication of [[ancient Roman civilization]] as well as the classical revival in the [[Renaissance]] to that of Nordic societies that Italian nationalists described as "newcomers" to civilization in comparison.{{sfnp|Gillette|2001|p=17}} At the height of antagonism between the Nazis and Italian fascists over race, Mussolini claimed that the Germans themselves were not a pure race and noted with irony that the Nazi theory of German racial superiority was based on the theories of non-German foreigners, such as Frenchman Arthur de Gobineau.{{sfnp|Gillette|2001|p=45}} After the tension in [[German-Italian relations]] diminished during the late 1930s, Italian fascism sought to harmonize its ideology with German Nazism and combined Nordicist and Mediterranean racial theories, noting that Italians were members of the Aryan Race, composed of a mixed Nordic-Mediterranean subtype.{{sfnp|Pollard|1998|p=129}}

In 1938, Mussolini declared upon Italy's adoption of antisemitic laws that Italian fascism had always been antisemitic.{{sfnp|Pollard|1998|p=129}} However, Italian fascism did not endorse [[antisemitism]] until the late 1930s when Mussolini feared alienating antisemitic Nazi Germany, whose power and influence were growing in Europe. Prior to that period, there had been notable [[Jewish Italians]] who had been senior Italian fascist officials, including [[Margherita Sarfatti]], who had also been Mussolini's mistress.{{sfnp|Pollard|1998|p=129}} Also contrary to Mussolini's claim in 1938, only a small number of Italian fascists were staunchly antisemitic (such as [[Roberto Farinacci]] and Giuseppe Preziosi), while others such as [[Italo Balbo]], who came from [[Ferrara]] which had one of Italy's largest Jewish communities, were disgusted by the antisemitic laws and opposed them.{{sfnp|Pollard|1998|p=129}} Fascism scholar Mark Neocleous notes that while Italian fascism did not have a clear commitment to antisemitism, there were occasional antisemitic statements issued prior to 1938, such as Mussolini in 1919 declaring that the Jewish bankers in London and New York were connected by race to the Russian Bolsheviks and that eight percent of the Russian Bolsheviks were Jews.{{sfnp|Neocleous|1997|pp=35–36}}